


John Hughes Made Me Do It

by oystergrrl



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Domestic Avengers, Fluff and Feels, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-27
Updated: 2015-04-27
Packaged: 2018-03-25 23:16:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3828538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oystergrrl/pseuds/oystergrrl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The story of how Steve Rogers came back to the world, told through '80s movies.</p>
            </blockquote>





	John Hughes Made Me Do It

**Author's Note:**

> So, the inspiration for this story was that bit in _CA: TWS_ where Natasha makes a joke about the movie _WarGames_ and tries to explain it to Steve, and he says he's seen it. From the first time I saw _TWS_ , I couldn't get the idea out of my head of Steve, fresh out of the ice, sitting in his apartment, watching that movie all by himself, and it was just so depressing, I had to do something to make myself feel better. So fic happened. 
> 
> This should be canon-compliant up through _CA: TWS _.__

1\. _WarGames_

Eventually, the one called Fury coaxes Steve into one of the big black vehicles that had appeared seemingly from nowhere, and they head back to the building he had just escaped from - SHIELD headquarters, Fury tells him, as if that's supposed to mean something. They escort him to a private room (a real one this time, sleek and cold and uncomfortable) and proceed to put him through a days-long battery of tests. The agents around him are kind, for the most part, and they try to put him at ease and give him the information he needs to understand what's happened, but aside from the part where he's told that SHIELD is what grew out of the SSR, he mostly tunes them out. It's dangerous to let his guard down, he knows, but it's all just too overwhelming.

Eventually, someone on Fury's staff finds him an apartment in Brooklyn, presumably because they think he'll feel more at home there. He likes it well enough - it's a lot nicer than anywhere he lived before, that's for sure - but in the end, it really doesn't matter. Any place would be the same to him in this new, strange, lonely future.

The unit had been fully furnished when he'd gotten there, everything brand new and shiny, since he'd basically been starting from scratch. After some finagling, Maria Hill had managed to get some of his old things back from a museum that had had them in storage, but he hadn't had the heart to look at them yet. The boxes sit unopened in a corner of the dining room

He's finally come around to the idea of learning about the modern world, if for no other reason than it is marginally less terrible than thinking about his past. Currently, he's watching movies on a laptop computer. Some SHIELD agent had been tasked with putting together a stack of DVDs for him, all of them, Steve had noted with bemusement, military-themed, but of decidedly variable quality: _Bridge On the River Kwai_ , _The Great Escape_ , _Patton_ , _From Here to Eternity_ , _The Green Berets_ , _A Few Good Men_ (Steve had actually really liked that one), _Good Morning, Vietnam_ (that one, too), _The Hunt for Red October_ , and so on. There had been some serialized TV shows, too - one called _M*A*S*H_ , and another called _Band of Brothers_ , which he had started watching but had to turn off; it had begun hitting a little too close to home.

Now he’s in the middle of something from the 1980s called _WarGames_ , in which a wise-ass teenager almost destroys the planet by accident on his computer.

In a way, the film is comforting. The premise is pretty silly, for one thing, and the computers in it look far more like the ones Howard had used than the sleek machine he is using to watch all these movies.

But there's also something sinister about it, with its world of cynicism and paranoia. Steve had heard whispers about they’d been working on at Los Alamos before he'd gone into the ice, and he'd already come across accounts of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the terrible sacrifices that had brought about the end of the war. It's sort of tragically impressive, the way people were able to dream up a weapon capable of such complete destruction, and he's horrified by the notion that the world lived under that threat of annihilation for so long.

And yet...

There's a scene where the wise-ass teenager and his girlfriend hunt down the professor who designed the troublesome computers in the story, hoping to get his assistance in stopping the nuclear war before it starts. He, however, is not having it. He's done, ready to throw in the towel and call it a day. He's just... tired.

“We’ll be spared the horror of survival," he says of the oncoming disaster.

Of course, since it's a movie, he comes around, and there's a heroic, last minute save, but that moment of Dr. Falken's emptiness, of his despair, sticks with Steve. When the movie ends, and he shuts down his laptop, he sits there in the dark living room for a long time before he goes to bed.

 

2. _Weird Science_

When it’s all over - once they’re all fed and rested and cleaned up, once Thor has taken Loki back to Asgard - Steve isn’t really sure what to do with himself. Should he sign up with SHIELD for real? Should he strike out on his own to try something new? He doesn't know.

As it turns out, he doesn’t really get much say in the matter.

He’s having breakfast at a diner down the street from his apartment when his jacket starts ringing. After fumbling around in it for a second, he finds a phone in his pocket and pulls it out. Looking around self-consciously, he answers it.

“Um, hello?”

“What are you doing Thursday night?” Tony says.

Steve holds the phone out and looks at it. It doesn’t divulge any secrets that would help this situation make any sense, so he lifts it back to his ear.

“How are you calling me?”

Tony sighs.

“I know you’re behind on technology, Star Spangles, but I figured you had that much down.”

“But I didn’t even know I had a phone.”

“Of course you have a phone - everyone has a phone,” Tony says. “So, Thursday?”

“Um, I’m pretty sure my schedule is clear.”

“All right,” Tony says. “If we’re going to be hanging out together, we need to get you up to speed. My place, 7:00. We’re having Movie Night.”

“We’re going to be hanging out?” Steve says, but Tony has already hung up.

And that’s how Steve finds himself sitting on a massive sofa in the den of Tony’s obscenely decadent apartment with Bruce on one side of him and Natasha on the other, watching two high school students build a woman on their computer (Steve isn't sure if this is better or worse than using a computer to blow up the world - he is sure that the '80s were a very odd time).

The computer guys, Gary and Wyatt, are being tormented by two bullies with cute girlfriends, and to Steve's surprise, one of the bullies seems very familiar.

He cocks his head.

“Tony,” he says. “That guy looks like you.”

“No, he doesn’t,” Tony says, too quickly, as if this is a conversation he’s had before.

Steve gives him a sidelong glance. If he’s not mistaken, he's found a soft spot in Tony’s prodigious ego, and maybe it makes him a bad person, but he can’t resist poking at it.

“Yeah, he really does.”

“Dude, he even sounds like you,” Clint pipes up, and Steve feels a surge of warmth towards him. .

“Yeah, I’m with them on this one, Stark” Natasha says, stuffing her mouth with popcorn.

Tony sighs theatrically

“You all are totally missing what’s important here," Tony says.

“Which is?” asks Clint.

“This movie is a tribute to human ingenuity,” Tony says. “Here are these two losers who are beaten down and powerless, but do they give up? No. They fight. They use their big nerdy brains and some of the best tech 1985 has to offer, and they carpe the goddamn diem. They change their destinies."

“Better living through science,” Bruce says.

“Yes!” Tony shouts. “Exactly, my brother! Up top!”

Bruce indulgently slaps him a high five.

"I mean, come on," Tony says. "That's beautiful."

Natasha shakes her head, and the others settle in to watch the rest of the movie.

“Incidentally,” says Bruce after a minute of two, “I am not helping you build a supermodel.”

“Oh, come on!”

“Nope.”

“But we could- “

“Uh-uh.”

“Or there’s -

“I said no.”

“OK, _fine_."  


 

3. _Big Trouble in Little China_

After that first get-together, Movie Night becomes something of a regular thing. Tony even graciously (in his own mind anyway) starts letting the others take turns picking movies. Bruce chooses _Slumdog Millionaire_ , which is an odd combination of disturbing and heartwarming. Natasha selects _Before Sunrise_ , which is sad and lovely.

And then it’s Clint’s turn.

Steve makes it roughly halfway through the movie before he can’t take it any more.

“Clint,” he says. “What is this?”

“Uh, only one of the greatest achievements in cinematic history,” Clint replies from the other couch, where he's wedged into the corner with Natasha's feet in his lap. "The jewel in John Carpenter's crown, which is saying something."

"I don't think Cap is really feeling it, Clint," Bruce observes.

"Well, he should be, because it's awesome," Clint replies.

“Verily, this Wang Chi is a mighty warrior,” says Thor.

Thor isn’t around for many of these get-togethers, but when he is, he joins in with great aplomb.

“Hey, what about my man Jack Burton?” Clint says, challenge clear in his voice.

“He is… very colorful,” Thor says diplomatically.

Clint narrows his eyes at Thor, and his face starts turning red. Natasha pokes him in the side with her toe.

“Clint,” she says.”It is literally the _entire point_ of the movie that Jack is a buffoon and doesn’t realize it. Don’t take your tenuous grasp of reality out on the demigod.”

Clint slumps back against the couch cushions, pouting.

“Haters gonna hate,” he mutters.

The movie continues, and half an hour or so later, there's an elaborate fight scene in a neon-lit temple with people shooting lightning at each other and having samurai spirit battles. Steve sighs, closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose.

“Am I on drugs?” he says. “Is this what being on drugs feels like?”

“You know,” says Tony. “If you’re really interested in finding out, I know a guy. It would be fascinating to see how the serum interacts with -“

“No, Tony,” says Natasha.

“Hey, Steve is a big boy,” Tony says. “I think he can speak for hims-“

“No, Tony,” says Bruce.

“You don’t even know what I was going to s-“

“No, Tony,” says Clint, and Tony looks wounded, because Clint has become his go-to conspirator for any and all ill-advised hijinks.

“Et tu, Barton?” he says with a sigh, getting and making his way to the kitchen. "Well, a wise man knows when he's beaten, I suppose."

As he reaches the door, he coughs, and it sounds suspiciously like the word "buzzkill".

 

4\. _The Neverending Story_

It’s the horse that does Steve in.

It’s not even that he particularly likes horses. He grew up in Brooklyn, for God’s sake. He feels a kinship to alley cats and scruffy mutts, and that’s about it.

But as he sits there watching Artax sink into the Swamps of Sadness as Ateryu helplessly wails his name, something goes taut inside of Steve that makes it difficult for him to breathe. In the space of a blink, he is in the ruins of a Hydra base, surrounded by the bodies of those he couldn't save; on a train, watching Bucky disappear into a veil of snow; plummeting into the Atlantic, icy water closing over his head.

Steve closes his eyes, waiting for the tension to ease, which it does, if only just barely. Once he is confident that his legs will support him, he gets up and quietly leaves the room.

He goes to the kitchen and opens the fridge, scanning the contents before pulling out a carton of juice. It’s some strange modern concoction, a blend of tropical things that don’t seem exotic to anyone but him anymore. But it’s cold, and it’s sweet, and he pours himself a tall glass before sitting down on one of the stools pulled up to the kitchen island, waiting for the tightness in his chest to unravel.

A minute or two later, he gets the feeling he’s being watched and turns to see who’s come after him.

It’s Natasha.

She’s leaning against the door frame with her arms crossed, her expression assessing. She seems content to watch him for the time being; there's no rush to talk, either to question Steve or to soothe him. It's one of Natasha's most distinguishing characteristics - her cool, attentive patience. The rest of them - himself included - seem to be in constant motion, always running, always doing. But the Black Widow appreciates stillness.

Steve respects that. He isn’t sure he trusts it, or her, but he respects it.

“You OK?” she says finally.

He opens his mouth to say yes, but it’s such a bold-faced lie that he can’t. Instead, he shrugs.

Soundlessly, she crosses the room and settles onto one of the other stools.

“Any of that juice left?”

Steve gets up and takes a glass from the cabinet, fills it with juice. He hands it to Natasha, who rolls it slowly between her palms.

"Kind of a rough scene there," she says.

"I just wasn't expecting it," Steve replies quietly, reclaiming his seat. "Clint said it was a movie for children, so I didn't think..."

He trails off, not quite sure how to finish that sentence.

“Word of advice?" Natasha says, her voice gentle. "You might want to give _The Lion King_ a pass. _Finding Nemo_ , too. Actually, anything by Pixar - that's the name of the production company."

“Duly noted,” Steve replies.

She takes a sip from her glass and quirks an eyebrow at him.

“Was _Bambi_ around in your day?”

“Oh, yeah,” Steve says with a shudder.

Natasha nods.

“People who make kids’ movies are assholes,” she says.

Steve looks at her sharply, but then, slowly, the corner of his mouth turns up.

They sit there in silence, drinking their juice.  


 

5\. _Top Gun_

“Pfft,” says Steve. “The Navy.”

“Right?” says Sam, and he throws popcorn at the screen.

  


6\. _The Goonies_

“That was great,” Steve says as the credits roll. “Why don’t we watch more movies like that?”

Tony sighs deeply.

“Of course you like the movie about the scrappy youngsters who foil bank robbers and find a pirate ship,” he says. “Of course you do. Isn’t that, like, the template for every boys’ adventure novel of the ‘30s? You might want to work on not being such a cliche there, Captain Goody Goody.”

Steve stands up and stretches, ignoring Tony; it's something he's becoming very adept at.

"Shut up, Tony," Natasha says cheerfully in his place. "Or I'll make you do the Truffle Shuffle."

"Oh, I'd like to see you try, Mata Hari," Tony shoots back.

Steve and Bruce go immediately still, glancing back and forth between the two of them apprehensively. Because there's no way Natasha's backing down from that kind of challenge.

"Now might be a good time for a hasty retreat," Bruce says quietly, an instant before Natasha pounces.

The two of them make their escape as a not-entirely-good natured battle involving couch cushions ensues. The elevator doors close just as Clint joins the fray from underneath the coffee table, and Tony lets out an indignant squack.

After seeing Bruce off on his floor and wishing him good night, Steve continues down to his own apartment (because he's living in the Tower now, and he's still not entirely sure how _that_ happened) and gets ready for bed. As he putters around, his buoyant mood shifts to something a bit more contemplative.

It continues to surprise him that he's built a life here - a good life. Things had gone horribly wrong, SHIELD had nearly collapsed, but he's still here, with his team, his _friends_ , some of the best he's ever had. He'd have laughed if you'd told him that when he'd first woken up - a bitter, jaded laugh that didn't sit well on him. Instead, he's still standing and he's not alone. Which is kind of amazing.

There's just one thing that's still missing.

They'd looked for months, he and Sam. Natasha, too, on occasion, and once even Clint. But Bucky was good, and whatever they did, he was one step ahead. Always a little bit further into the wind.

It had just about killed Steve to come home, but he'd known they'd needed to rest and regroup, maybe pick through some of those files Natasha had dumped on the Internet to find useful intel. But time had passed now. He's getting to the point where he needs to go out again. And on nights like this, thinking of the weirdos who have his back, he feels strangey hopeful.

He gives the mirror a wry smile as he brushes his teeth.

Goonies never say die.

With his mind churning like that, it takes him a while to get to sleep. Just as he's finally nodding off, JARVIS's voice comes over the intercom

“Captain Rogers,” he says, sounding apologetic.

Steve rolls over on his back and sighs.

“Yes?”

“Your presence has been requested downstairs.”

Steve takes this in.

“Right now?”

“I believe so, yes.”

“JARVIS,” Steve says. “It’s 2 o’clock in the morning.”

“I understand, Captain, but Sir was quite insiste-“

JARVIS’s clipped voice clicks off, replaced by Tony’s.

“Steve, I really think you ought to get down here.”

In an instant, Steve is on alert, in no small part because Tony is using his actual name.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, nothing,” Tony hurries to assure him. “It’s just, uh… you have a visitor.”

For a moment, Steve is frozen in place, his head and insides feeling strangely light. Then he is bolting for the elevator, not even bothering with shoes in his rush.

When the doors open on one of the Tower’s lower floors, Steve takes off down the hall at a dead run, but as he reaches the door JARVIS had directed him to, he slows. He’s both desperate to get in there and terrified of what he’ll find. But he knows there’s no way around but through, so he takes a deep breath, and he knocks.

Tony answers the door, looking more than a little like the cat that got the canary, and ushers Steve inside. Happy and another Stark security guy are there, calm and casual, but with sidearms at the ready, because a flippant narcissist Tony may be, but he is not an idiot. He nods toward the couch, and Steve turns to the figure sitting there, hunched over and clearly exhausted.

He looks awful. Really, really awful. He’s dressed in a hodge-podge of tac gear and presumably stolen clothing, all of it filthy. His hair is hanging around his face in greasy clumps, and the hands that dangle limply between his knees are dirty and scratched; at least one fingernail is missing. When he lifts his head, he's gaunt and pale, and Steve wonders how long it’s been since he had a proper meal. But his eyes… his eyes are as familiar to Steve as anything has ever been.

“Hiya, punk.” he says, his voice tired and wary and full of Brooklyn.

Steve swallows, his heart beating hard.

“Hey, Buck,” he says.

  


7. _The Breakfast Club_

As it turns out, having a traumatized, cybernetically-enhanced assassin around is messy and unpredictable and just really, really hard.

Steve realizes, of course, that actually being the traumatized cybernetically-enhanced assassin has got to be a thousand times worse, but even so, trying to take care of Bucky is… well, it’s a lot. There’s the mood swings and the insomnia, the compulsive checking of doors and windows and the refusals to eat. There’s counseling and meds and endless rounds of tests. Steve knows that deep down at his core, he’s still Bucky, but there’s a lot of scar tissue - both literal and figurative - that’s built up over the years, and healing is just going to take time.

It’s not all terrible. There are days when his head is clear and he can crack jokes and ask Steve about the memories that continue to surface. Sometimes, even though he still has a hard time articulating it, Steve can tell he’s utterly delighted by various things, whether it’s because they remind him of life Before (watching a baseball game on TV) or because they’re completely new (his first encounter with salted caramel gelato).

But the rough times are really rough.

Out of all of it, Steve's least favorite is probably the nightmares. Sometimes, Bucky just wakes up screaming and disoriented, practically hyperventilating in his panic, and that’s bad enough. But more often, he starts trying to fight his way out of the apartment before he's fully awake, which has resulted in a concussion on his own part (from bashing his head against the reinforced glass of the bedroom window), a fractured wrist and two cracked ribs on Steve's (the bones had healed in a matter of hours, but Bucky had been devastated for days), and a lot of broken furniture. Tony had started off being characteristically breezy and dismissive about the property damage, but Steve suspects he's starting to lose patience; the last dresser that had appeared in Bucky’s room had actually come from Ikea, which Steve knows Tony considers an insult to good taste.

It's around three when Bucky's shouts wake Steve up on this particular night, and he's down the hall in a matter of seconds. Bucky is at least still in the bed this time, sweating and shaking and looking generally wrecked. Steve sits gently on the side of the bed, reaching out for him.

“Shh,” he says, pulling Bucky close. “It’s OK, Buck. I’ve got you. I’ve got you.”

Bucky tenses in his arms and then shoves at his chest.

“Who, Steve?” he snaps. “Who have you got? I can’t even keep track  of who’s in here, so how in the hell can you?"

He presses his fist to his forehead, as if he's trying to reach into his skull and straighten out the mess.

"They're all there, taking up space. The Bucky from Before, and the Asset, and whoever the hell I'm supposed to be now. They're all trying to stake their claim, and they won't let me have a goddamn moment's peace."

He tends to talk more when he's angry, and they want him to talk, so Steve is hesitant to interrupt, but it still hurts to hear Bucky when he gets like this.

"I don't fit anywhere," he says. "I feel like I'll never fit anywhere. You should have put me down when you had the chance."

The only reason Steve doesn't completely lose it in the face of this sentiment is that it is far from the first time he's heard it; instead he just sits there, quiet in the face of Bucky's rage. Bucky lets out a frustrated breath, practically a growl, as he throws off the blankets and storms out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

He keeps largely to himself for the next few days, speaking only when spoken to, and even then keeping his answers short and gruff. When Steve finally gets around to asking if he wants to go to Movie Night this week, he grunts something vaguely affirmative, and Steve counts it as a win.

It's another John Hughes movie, which the others seem to really love for some reason. Steve isn't sure he gets it - _Weird Science_ was what it was, and he'd enjoyed _Ferris Bueller's Day Off_ , but _Sixteen Candles_ had been a decidedly underwhelming experience - but if Bucky is up for it, it pretty much goes without saying that he is, too.

The movie is heavy on the teen angst (or, as Natasha puts it, "teeeeeen aaaaaaaangst"), but Steve likes it. He feels for these kids, as they circle each other warily, desperate to connect, but just as desperate not to show it.

What gets his attention even more, though, is the way Bucky reacts. He starts off the evening pressed tightly into the corner of one of the overstuffed armchairs, glaring sullenly at the room at large through his hair. Within the first few minutes, though, he perks up a little. Steve notices that he seems particularly engaged when the character Bender is on-screen, but he pays close attention throughout. By the end, he's actually leaning forward in his seat, rapt.

As the kids file out of the protective bubble of the school library and back to their lives, the principal reads over their letter, the one they convinced the nerdy one, Brian, to write on their behalf.

"Dear Mr. Vernon, we accept the fact that we had to sacrifice a whole Saturday in detention for whatever it was we did wrong. But we think you're crazy to make us write an essay telling you who we think we are. You see us as you want to see us - in the simplest terms, in the most convenient definitions."

"But what we found out is that each one of us is a brain...and an athlete...and a basket case... a princess...and a criminal."

"Does that answer your question? Sincerely yours, The Breakfast Club."

As John Bender thrusts his fist in the air, something flares behind Bucky's eyes - something fierce and raw, something that fills Steve with hope.

A few days later, a diamond stud appears in Bucky’s ear. Steve doesn't comment on it, but every time he sees it, he smiles.

  


8\. _Say Anything_

Steve hesitates to even think it, for fear of jinxing everything, but things have started going really well. He’d been out on assignment this week, doing work that feels worthwhile. He’d checked in with Bucky twice a day via Skype, and Bucky had had a good week, too, even though it was the longest they’d been apart since Bucky’s return. (Bucky had been having more and more good weeks lately, and in the moments when Steve allows himself to really think about it, it was enough to make him weak with relief. But he doesn’t allow himself  that luxury often. Because of the jinxing.) When he gets home, he’s ready to spend time with Bucky and see his team, so it’s convenient that it’s time for Movie Night.

Tonight's film is _Say Anything_ , and Steve is actually really looking forward to it. They’d watched other movies by Cameron Crowe before - _Jerry Maguire_ and _We Bought a Zoo_ \- and Steve had liked them. Something about the rhythm of the dialogue reminds him of the screwball comedies he’d grown up with. This one is about a hapless teenager in love with an incredibly smart girl (and what was it with the '80s and movies about teenagers - were there no movies about adults from that decade that didn't involve martial arts or fighter planes?).

They're very sweet, Lloyd and Diane. Steve feels bad for them as they break up for what actually seem to be pretty good, if still painful, reasons ("I gave her my heart; she gave me a pen.") and then stumble along in a confused haze of loss ("If you guys know so much about women, how come you're here at, like, the Gas 'n' Sip on a Saturday night completely alone, drinking beers with no women anywhere?").

"Here it comes," someone in the room mutters, as the camera cuts to Diane tossing restlessly in her bed. There are faint strains of music, and then there's Lloyd, looking heartbroken and  holding a radio over his head that's playing the song they'd lost their virginity to a few scenes earlier. It's a powerful scene and a really, really great song. There's a lot Steve doesn't get about modern music (for example, no one will ever be able to explain Iggy Azalea to him, though Clint has certainly tried), but every once in a while, he comes across something that really moves him, something that hits him where he lives, as Bruce puts it.

This is one of those things. It’s perfect.

“I tried that once, you know,” Clint says, breaking Steve out of his reverie.

“Yeah?” Tony says. “How’d it work out for you?”

“Girl’s dad came after me with a baseball bat,” Clint replies. “Might have had something to do with the fact that I went with “You Shook Me All Night Long” instead of Peter Gabriel”.

“AC/DC is always a solid choice, my man,” Tony says approvingly. They bump fists over Natasha’s head.

Later, when the get-together's over and Steve and Bucky are back in their apartment, Bucky says, more or less out of nowhere, "I really liked that movie".

Steve has to make a real effort not to do anything drastic, because Bucky has been working very hard on allowing himself to respond to things and have opinions, but he still doesn't express them so directly very often, and it really makes Steve want to punch the air in triumph.

But that type of thing tends to make Bucky self-conscious, so Steve limits himself to saying, "Yeah, me, too, Buck."

Bucky seems to consider this for a second, then gives a little nod.

"I'm gonna get some water before I go to bed," he says, turning toward the kitchen. "'Night, Steve."

"G'night," Steve says, watching him go before heading to his own bedroom.

Steve drifts off feeling warm inside from even this small victory. He's having some sort of intangible but pleasant dream when he wakes an hour or so later, drawn back out of sleep by sounds coming from the living room. They don't sound particularly ominous, but he decides to get up and make sure Bucky's OK, just in case.

When he gets to the living room doorway, Steve freezes. Bucky is stretched out on the couch in the dark room with his eyes closed and his phone in his hand, illuminating his face with its feeble light. As Steve listens, he recognizes the music coming out of it.

It’s the song from _Say Anything_. The one playing on the radio Lloyd holds up over his head.

Bucky looks… peaceful. Serene, even. Steve hasn’t seen him look like that since he came back. It was actually pretty rare for him to look like that even Before. He always took on so much, wanting to take care of everyone, protect them.

Steve leans closer, trying to make out the lyrics:

_Accepting all I've done and said,_

_I want to stand and stare again_

_'Til there's nothing left out, oh whoa whoa_

_It remains there in your eyes_

_Whatever comes and goes_

_Oh, it's in your eyes_

Steve feels a visceral surge of emotion, and, a moment later, he identifies it with a sense of wonder.

He loves Bucky.

Which, on the one hand, isn’t all that strange, because he’s always loved Bucky. But what he is feeling, standing there in the doorway of the dark living room, is not brotherly affection. It is heart-fluttering, stomach-wrenching, sweaty-palmed being in love.

And Steve doesn’t have the first idea what to do about it.

The song comes to an end and the next one comes on, something loud and upbeat. Bucky winces and cracks an eye so he can select a different track, and Steve takes an instinctive step backwards, further into the shadows. He stands there watching for a moment as Bucky settles back down, then slips, unnoticed, back to his bedroom.

He doesn’t sleep much that night.

 

9. _Some Kind of Wonderful_

It's a surreal week that follows. Steve is desperate to act like nothing's changed, but he's kind of terrible at it (he always did have a lousy poker face), and after two or three days, it's clear that Bucky is getting worried, following Steve around with a concerned expression on his face, in a strange and uncomfortable reversal of their usual roles. He starts getting bewildered looks from the others, as well, which he flat-out refuses to acknowledge.

He has never been so happy to have Movie Night when it rolls around; the notion of sitting in the dark while the others payed him not one bit of attention is absolute heaven. Tonight, they're watching another John Hughes movie - _Some Kind of Wonderful_. Steve doesn’t know much else about it, but Bruce and Natasha both like it, which is usually a good sign.

The others had been already more or less settled in when Steve and Bucky arrived, so by the time they get their snacks and head into the den to find their seats, the opening credits are over. Almost as soon as he steps through the door, Bucky stops dead in his tracks, his eyes going wide.

“You OK there, Sarge?” Tony says, and usually that drives Bucky crazy, since Tony has been told a thousand times that Bucky is not, in fact, a sergeant anymore, but this time all he does is say, “Nah… nah, it’s nothing” before drifting over to an empty spot on the couch. Tony raises his eyebrows at Steve, questioning, but Steve just follows Bucky and pretends not to notice. Because he knows exactly what caught Bucky’s attention, and it’s not something he really wants to share with the group.

It’s that the girl on the screen, Watts, looks just like Steve used to, before the war.

No, strike that - she doesn’t just look like him. She could be him, all slim and delicate, with the same blonde hair and enormous chip on her shoulder.

And it gets worse. In one of the very first scenes, Watts's best friend Keith, who is apparently the Bucky stand-in in this scenario, intervenes to keep Watts from getting into a fight with a tough guy twice her size. As the movie proceeds, it turns out Keith is in love with beautiful Amanda, while Watts is pining for him and getting progressively worse at hiding it.

Which, of course, leads to a kissing scene.

Through a series of awkward, implausible events, Keith swings a date with Amanda, and Watts not-so-charitably offers to help him practice kissing. You know, so he doesn't embarrass himself. And then they make out.

Steve is suddenly extra glad the lights are turned down, because he can feel heat blooming in his chest and spreading up his face and neck, and he knows that if it wasn't dark, everyone would see him turning bright red. As it is, when he happens to glance over in Natasha's direction, she's watching him pointedly and smirking. Curse her absurd powers of observation.

Dimly, Steve realizes that Bucky, who's sitting next to him and had been making his way steadily through a massive box of Junior Mints, has gone rather still. Just as he starts to panic, though, Bucky shakes the box and pops a few more candies into his mouth, seemingly - thankfully -oblivious to the fact that Steve is sitting there having a crisis.

Once the movie has finally come to an end, complete with love declarations and even more kissing, Steve ducks out as fast as he possibly can. He catches a glimpse of Bucky looking after him questioningly in the corner of his eye, but there is no way he can pull off acting normal in front of Bucky right now, so he just keeps going.

When he gets down to his apartment, he changes into his pajamas and climbs into bed. He tries to read, but it's pretty much a lost cause from the get-go. He drops the book into his lap with a sigh, knocking his head back against the headboard a few times. He has to do something; there's no way he can go on like this indefinitely. Maybe, he thinks, he should talk to Bruce. Bruce would be the least likely to laugh at him, plus he'd have some insight into how to keep these  incredibly inconvenient emotions from taking over Steve’s life. Yes - he will definitely talk to Bruce in the morning.

There's a soft knock at his door. Steve had only heard the front door open once, and there hadn’t been any voices in conversation, so it can really only be Bucky; he tries to ignore the way that makes his heartbeat pick up.

"Come in," he calls.

Bucky opens the door and slips inside, but then he just kind of hovers, leaning a hip against Steve’s dresser and  fidgeting a little. His hair is loose around his face, and he is wearing only a white tank top and soft blue pajama pants, which is doing nothing for Steve's resolve.

"Can I, uh... can I talk to you for a minute?" he says finally.

"Sure, Buck," Steve says, moving his legs so Bucky has room to sit on the bed. Bucky comes over and settles gingerly on the edge, facing the wall with his elbows on his knees.

“So in the movie,” he says, one leg bouncing nervously, “they were best friends, right?”

“Yeah,” says Steve.

Bucky’s gaze drops to the floor.

“Until, um… until they weren't."

Steve's pulse is well and truly racing now, even before Bucky turns towards him abruptly, as if he's afraid that if he doesn't do this right now, he'll lose his nerve. He reaches up to run his metal fingers along Steve's collarbone, then slides his hand firmly around the back of Steve's neck, but his breathing is shallow, and he's having trouble meeting Steve's eyes. Steve moves to touch his elbow, trying to comfort him.

" _Steve_ ," Bucky breathes, sounding almost pained, and Steve has been trying so hard to keep his feelings to himself, not wanting to push Bucky into something he doesn’t want and isn’t ready for, but now it seems like a mercy to lean in and brush Bucky’s lips with his own.

Even though he’s the one to initiate it, Steve is just as startled as Bucky seems to be by the jolt that runs through him. They pull apart and look at each other for a moment, disoriented, until Steve regains the presence of mind to realize there’s nothing stopping them from doing it again. He cups Bucky’s face with his palm, then presses their mouths together, properly this time. They take their time, going gently, tentatively, right up to the point where Bucky runs his tongue over Steve’s lower lip and Steve makes a noise that he swears they will never, ever speak of. Then Bucky hauls him closer, and it’s all wet heat and searching hands, until they slump against each other, desperate for air.

“You’re really good at this,” Steve murmurs, as he tucks a lock of Bucky’s hair behind his ear.

“You’re not so bad yourself, for an amateur,” Bucky retorts.

Steve huffs out a laugh.

“Shut up, jerk."

“Make me,” Bucky says.

So Steve does.  


 

Epilogue: _Pretty in Pink_

It’s yet another John Hughes film tonight, with that redheaded actress who's in so many of them. This time, the antagonist seems to have some weird, unrequited crush on her, which only serves to make him extra nasty, to the point where he actively sabotages her relationship with his (alleged) best friend.

The girl, Andie, and the (alleged) best friend, Blaine, have just had a spectacular argument about the prom in the school hallway, resulting in Andie running off in tears and Blaine standing there looking miserable and dejected.

The nasty antagonist, Stef, is on hand to provide commentary.

“The girl was, is, and will always be nada,” he says as Blaine slinks off to lick his wounds.

“That guy’s a _douche_ ,” Steve blurts, and one by one, the others start laughing, because Steve saying crude things is still jarring and hilarious to everyone except Bucky (who is currently sprawled on the couch with his head in Steve’s lap, having been rendered a useless puddle of super-soldier goo by Steve’s fingers carding through his hair).

“Hard to argue with that,” Natasha says. “That actor has been a complete dick in just about everything he’s ever been in.”

“Yeah,” Bruce says. “If you need someone to play a villain, that’s your guy.”

Tony nods distractedly, as he goes back to tinkering with the plans of his latest project. His working title for it is Ultron.

  


**Author's Note:**

> I took a wee bit of artistic license, in that the lyrics I quoted from Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes" are only in the extended live version of the song, not the "official" one in _Say Anything_ , but I wanted to use them, and I could, so I did. :)


End file.
